Rethinking Reform: ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Ṭāhā and the Temporal Reconceptualization of the Authenticity–Modernity Paradigm

Abstract

This article looks to reconceptualize the question of reform in modern Islamic society through the work of the Moroccan thinker ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Ṭāhā by highlighting how he redefines concepts central to contemporary Arab thought using an alternative temporal perspective. Starting from the observation that discussions on the reform of heritage prominent in contemporary Arab thought display a linear-progressive character that sustains its dichotomous character as a seemingly interminable contest between modernizers and traditionalists, we will discuss Ṭāhā’s argument for puncturing the recurring structure of these debates by proposing a conceptualization of time that locates the essence of modernity in an authentic past. Not only does this reconfigure received interpretations of concepts of modernity and authenticity, but it also shows how, given the foundational role that the dominant linear-progressive conception of time plays in structuring Arab-Islamic thought, a reconceptualization of time can open up ways of reconceptualizing this entire debate and the question of reform at the center of it.